Matt Trowbridge: Star power vs. star potential at Rockford Pro-Am

Eleven times he’s come to the Pro-Am now, and Perry remains as popular as ever, drawing crowds of up to 500 fans around him at Monday’s 38th annual Pro-Am at Forest Hills Country Club.

“Being with Kenny Perry is such a pleasure,” said Harlem senior Joey Watts, one of the four high school golfers sponsored by Alpine Bank who played with Perry. “He is just a genuine guy. He’s really fun to be around. I don’t think you can have a bad time around him.”

Or attract any notice if you are NOT around him.

Perry, with $32 million in earnings on the PGA Tour and three major championships within the last year on the Champions Tour, is easily the greatest golfer who repeatedly returns to Rockford.

“There is a loyalty to this tournament by him,” David Pearce, a volunteer who has helped drive the pros to Rockford since 1987, said as he watched Perry putt on No. 9. “I just wish there were more big-name people who would do that as well. They need to get more Kenny Perrys out here.”

Maybe they did. But if so, they are future Kenny Perrys, not current ones, bursting with promise, but lacking PGA titles.

First-month pros Patrick Rodgers, Cameron Wilson and Bobby Wyatt were probably the three greatest golfers in college this year. Rodgers was the world’s No. 1-ranked amateur. Wilson won the NCAA title. Wyatt led Alabama to back-to-back NCAA team titles.

And yet every time I checked Monday, none of the three had a gallery of more than a dozen fans around them while Perry’s crowd never dipped below 200.

And even the fans around Rodgers, Wilson and Wyatt weren’t necessarily there for them. Les and Carol Johnson started out following Perry, but then moved on to Wilson’s group — only they were really there to see one of Wilson’s amateurs, Mike Ericksen.

“We only get one chance,” Les Johnson said, before repeating himself for emphasis. “We only get one chance a year to see Kenny Perry, and I love Kenny Perry.

“He’s wonderful and he does a lot for charities. I appreciate the other guys coming up, but he is The Man.”

Yes, he is. You can’t go to the Rockford Pro-Am and not see Kenny Perry. That would be like visiting New York City for the first time and not seeing the Statue of Liberty. Or going to a Padres game and not eating a fish taco.

“Kenny personifies what golf is all about,” Pro-Am tournament director Judi Sheley said. “He is a true gentleman. Everything about him is what the game of golf is supposed to be.”

But if Kenny Perry is the Pro-Am’s Statue of Liberty, Rodgers, Wilson and Wyatt are the Empire State Building, Times Square and Central Park. The Pro-Am has reinvented itself around up-and-coming golfers, and fans who didn’t try to watch that trio missed much of what the Pro-Am had to offer.

“A lot of people don’t follow that young age group,” said former Boylan star Melissa VanSistine, who was caddying for her dad in Rodgers’ group. “They are missing out. He (Rodgers) is going to do something great, and they are going to miss out on seeing him before it happens.”

“They don’t know who he is yet,” Sheley said. “Next year they’ll say, ‘Oh, that was that kid.’ We have a lot of young golfers here that we’re going to be reading about for a long time.”

But this may have been Rockford’s only chance to see Rodgers, Wilson and Wyatt, and not just see them, but walk down the fairways with them and talk to them. Next year, they may be in the British Open. If they are as good as Pro-Am officials expect, this may have been Rockford’s only chance to see them.